Introduction:
Researches indicate that play is an increasingly more varied and complex activity than what it was thought to be and has a significant influence on the physical, cognitive and social development of children along with academic activities.
Despite of their varying orientations, many famous child development theorists, agree that play benefits children in many different ways and that it occupies a central role in childhood development.
• Briefly explain the difference between the two major categories of play, structured and Unstructured - e.g. Children try to achieve pre-existing objectives set usually by an adult in structured play while they establish their own objectives in free/unstructured play.
• Introduce the link between
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• Discuss how the four skills (Body awareness, spatial awareness, directional awareness, temporal awareness) in perceptual-motor development are enhanced through play- e.g: Body awareness or an understanding about the different parts of the body and their movement and abilities is developed in activities such as walking, skipping and hanging,
Play and Cognitive Development:
• Discuss with evidence the link between play and brain development: e.g. An experiment conducted with rats showed that rats raised in enriched environments with peers developed thicker cortices in brain than those in isolated environments which indicate enhanced activity of the specific function assigned to the cortex such as recognition.
Child development theorists supporting the idea of play and cognitive development:
• Jean Piaget: He believed that play contributes to the expansion of cognitive abilities in children including language development, creativity and development of imagination, intelligence, and critical
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• Discuss with examples what social skills are developed through group play- e.g.: being able to handle stress, exclusion and dominance, face conflicts and challenges and learn self-control.
• Discuss development of autonomy and independence through play and its importance for children in their socialisation.
Child development theorists supporting the idea of play and cognitive development:
• Lev Vygotsky: He suggests that learning to follow rules in order to continue the play will aid children in learning to take feelings and ideas of others into consideration.
• Jean Piaget: He believed that the empathy that children show one another by taking turns, cooperating and sharing through play, signals of their awareness of others.
However free play time for children is declining due to busy lifestyle of parents and many parents believing free play to be an unproductive or waste of time compared to structured play such as organized sports which are professionally taught.
Exploring How Psychologists Study the Role of Play in Child Development Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, New Edition, 1995 defines “play” as: “[Children] when children play, they do things that they enjoy, often together or with toys. ” Play is one of the most powerful vehicles children have for trying out and mastering new social skills, concepts and experiences. Psychologists, such as Faulkner (1995), present evidence that play is seen as a mean of developing social skills and interpersonal relationships with others. The first section of the essay will present the different approaches psychologists use in the quest to learn about the role of children’s play and their related issues. This section will briefly define the nature of play and the different types of play that influence social development.
... play has a strong impact on a child’s emotional development as well (Hjelmstedt & Collins, 2008).
Like the latter, an essay by Gray, P. (2016) also showed researches on play deficit. He found out that most professionals who succeeded and happy are those who were not deprived in playing. He then concluded that, play deprivation is not good for children and other things. It promotes anxiety, depression, narcissism, loss of creativity and
Piaget also commented that about ages four to seven, game playing is egocentric; there is neither a strong sense of cooperation nor of competition. Children do not understand rules very well or they make them up as they go along. However, there are other theorists who have held diverging views. Vygotsky (1978), for instance, e...
All children play and it is something that most children do because they are having fun, but without realising children are developing and learning skills when they are engaged in play. Play helps stimulate the mind as it is practical and gives children the chance to explore and experience new situations. It can also ensure that children get to think by themselves and be spontaneous as they control their own play. Children get the chance to be creative and imaginative which develops independence for children. Play is vital for child development and helps children develop five main areas of development:
For all living beings play is an instinctive biological disposition, which helps to facilitate and enrich children’s overall development. As well as play being beneficial in assisting individual lives, many theorists as well as researchers have shown play to form a fundamenta...
The recess project has become a well renowned program. The recess project's goal is to advocate structured play among today’s children. “Recess leaders help the older children on the playground become leaders themselves, guiding younger children as they learn how to juggle or make crafts or do Zumba, the dance like exercise regimen set to fast-paced music”(Paul Par 5) . This is important because recess leaders from the recess project felt the need to help the older children on the playground. Recess leaders proved that with guidance and structure the older children gain the responsibility to guide the younger children in complex activities. Structured play drives strategy and following directions because with structured play children are given a specific set of guidelines and rules. After receiving rules and guidelines it is then up to the child to go from there and play(Nelson Par 1). There are numerous activities involved with structured play. The varying activities teach children how to follow and understand directions. This also helps children complete tasks. Various structured activities include board games, puzzles, and arts and crafts(Nelson Par 3). Anyone who has ever dealt with a child or children know things may become very messy, what if there was a way children can be taught life skills such as cleaning? In fact that is what structured play can do. As children are
Many theorists have tried to define play as a concept, however, no two agree on a set definition. Their backgrounds and induvial lifestyles influence the way they see the importance of play. Reed and Brown also believe that there isn’t an agreed definition of play because is something that is felt rather than done (Reed & Brown, 2000 cited in Brock, Dodd’s, Jarvis & Olusoga, 2009). In spite of this, it is clear that most theorists uphold the ethos that play is imperative to a child’s learning and development. There is a wide range of different studies and theories which helps us develop our own perception of what play is. In my personal experience I have found play to be a way of expressive our emotions, exploring and learning new things, thus
When children play, is a way for them to develop and learn new skills. The children that play have a positive future comparing to those that don’t play at all. For example, I was a reading an article regarding the generation from today. There was a study conducted with two groups of children. One group had no technology and was in nature camping. The other group wasn’t in the nature camp. The children that had no technology were able to recognize the emotions from the picture. Playing helps the children to interact and assimilate the roles to the real life world. According to the text, we learn best when we are having fun (p. 287). The reason is that the children are having first-hand experience and impact events are easily to recognize. When we play, we start to develop his concepts: imaginary friend, cognitive, language, feelings, empathy, empathy, and many more. It seems that as young children play, they learn many cognitive and social skills that result in social competence later in their childhood (p. 287). Also, as
Children develop normally when they are exposed to different types of play that allow them to express themselves while using their imaginations and being physically active. According to the Center for Health Education, Training and Nutrition Awareness, “Play is child’s work”; this is true because it is a child’s job to learn and develop in their first few years of life, in order for them to do this, they play. Not only is playing a child’s full time job, the United Nations High Commission for Human Rights listed play as a right of every child. Through their full time job of play, the children develop emotionally, socially, physically, and creatively. Children need to participate in child-led play in order to facilitate healthy development of their minds, body, and creativity.
Many theories have illustrated the role of play in children for their development. According to Jean Piaget children are actively involved in their environment. The child initiates an activity and assembles the necessary information through exploration of his environment. This is where Piaget’s introduced schema. Schema is basically how knowledge is structured or categorized in a child’s mind. According to Piaget (2006), schema is formed through the process of assimilation (child views the environment according to his way) and accommodation (enhancing on the knowledge the child already knows). Piaget suggested that children developed through 3 stages: mastery stage/ practice play, play stage/symbolic play and game stage/ games with rules (MCI, Child development module, chapter IV, 2013).
Children have a natural inclination to play, alongside a natural instinct to learn and to be curious and inventive, which are characteristics of the human race in general. This quote taken from Janet Moyles is a good starting point for this essay. It is well known that children love to play. If a child were to be left to his/her own devices they would happily play and create new worlds anywhere they were left. It has been well documented and researched that children learn excellently through play. However they are not always given the opportunity to do so, instead being told to, ‘finish your work and then you can go play’. Obviously this is not always the case, but the fact that it is a common practice shows that we do not all fully appreciate the importance of play to children’s learning. This essay will attempt to show how children learn through play, making reference to current theory and practice. I will also give examples from my own first-hand experience of how children learn and develop as people through play.
Before diving into my research, I reflected on the knowledge I already knew regarding play and play based learning. From experience, I know that play is an enjoyable activity for children, and even some adults. I know that there are different ways one can play. For example, playing with others is known as cooperative play and playing alone is considered solitary play. There are different types of play. For example, there is dress up or pretend games, which is considered dramatic, play and there is playing with building blocks which is constructive play. After my reflection I realized that I was more knowledgeable on the action of playing rather then the benefits of it.
A very wise man; Charles Schaefer, once said “We are never more fully alive, more completely ourselves, or more deeply engrossed in anything than when we are playing.” To begin with, there is no one explanation about what play really is, other than the fact that it holds infinite numbers of definitions according to every single individual. Play is just not a physical body movement involved in an activity, but more than that if you look outside of the box. For centuries, play has been practiced in its own unique way with not only children, but adults as well.
By interacting with others in play settings, children learn social rules such as, taking turns, trade, cooperation, sharing, rules, and mixing with other. They discover scenes and stories, solve problems, and negotiate their idea through social barriers. They know what they want to do and work conscientiously to do it. they learn the powerful lesson of pursuing their own ideas to a successful conclusion. Also, support most children progress from an egocentric view of the world to an understanding of the importance of social skills and rules, they learn that games such as follows the Leader, baseball, and soccer cannot work without everyone obeying to the same set of rules. It teaches children life has rules (laws) that we all must follow to function effectively. Research shows that children who involve “(in complex forms of socio-dramatic play have greater language skills than non-players, better social skills, more empathy, more imagination, and more of the subtle capacity to know what others mean. They are less aggressive and show more self-control and higher levels of thinking”.